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Show LBJ Delays Rail Strike For 15 Days WASHINGTON AP) President Presi-dent Johnson requested Thursday Thurs-day night a 20-day postponement in the national rail work stoppage stop-page scheduled for 12:01 a.m. Friday but received only a 15-day 15-day delay. THE NEWS came in a bizarre fashion when a television technician tech-nician mounted a prompting device de-vice atop a waiting camera in a White House offiee. Across a screen on this piece of equipment was written the start of Johnson's statement in large letters. In mounting the device on the camera, the technician tech-nician turned it so newsmen waiting to hear the President, could read it even before Johnson John-son entered the room. NEGOTIATORS for more than 200 railroads and five operating unions met briefly with Johnson at the White House a little after 6 p.m. EST to hear his appeal for a 20-day delay and a request that they give him their decision deci-sion by 8 o'clock. The union and carrier representatives repre-sentatives returned to the White House shortly before the agreed time but 8 o'clock passed and then 9, 9:30, 10 and 10:30 with no word from the White House. Technical arrangements were made between 8 and 8:30 for Johnson to go on television and radio from the Fish Room, a room in the executive offices often used for presidential broadcasts. But two hours later he had not gone on the air and there had been no announcement. |